By Jennifer Taylor/reporter
Even models are unhappy with their bodies and unhealthy as well, a SE Campus teacher said during a seminar last week.
In Self-Image—The Fantasy and the Reality Feb. 5, Jason Wooten, assistant professor of physical education, told students learning to respect one’s body in today’s society is hard for anybody to do.
The way people deal and react to their bodies and the severity of their dissatisfaction are the main problem today. A lot of people have an image of how they would like their bodies to be, but having someone tell a person what he or she should looks like is very hard for that person to accept, Wooten said.
Filling out a Body Image States Scale can reveal how people truly think of themselves. The scale consists of a grid with questions dealing with individuals’ views on their bodies and their feelings, from extremely satisfied to extremely dissatisfied. The scale asks participant to rate themselves on the following options: physical attractiveness, weight, size and shape of body and physical appearance.
Everyone in this world is very harsh on his or her looks because society portrays what “perfect” should be. Making this dissatisfaction with one’s own body obvious on a scale further points this problem out, Wooten said.
Women especially can be very critical of their weight and the way they look when they walk out the door every morning. Seeing magazine models who look “perfect” can make women depressed and unhappy. Even famous clothes designers can think their models are too skinny.
“ I have never liked thin girls, and I have never made them go on the cat walk,” Giorgio Armani once said.
Wooten pointed out the serious health risks of ultra thin models.
“ Models have died at 5 feet 9 inches at 98 pounds and at a BMI of 14.5 due to anorexia,” he said.
Wooten said men may have some of the same problems women do, but they will seldom admit it.
Watching professional sports players being over muscular can make men think they need to look like that as well. Little do they know, Wooten said, that overtraining, exercising too much with no rest for recovery can be extremely unhealthy.
“ Wrestlers that use pills with creatine in it have died of dehydration and water loss,” he said.
While society has put out an image of how the “perfect body” should be, people start believing that is how they should look.
Two different shapes and sizes of people in this world cannot realistically have the same “perfect body.”
This is why it is so hard for people to accept themselves for who they are, Wooten said.
